Merle Haggard

Merle Ronald "the Hag" Haggard (6 April 1937-6 April 2016) was an American country singer from Oildale, California. He was born to a family of Okies who had migrated to California during the Great Depression, and, after his father died in 1945, he had a troubled childhood, and he was incarcerated several times. After being released from San Quentin State Prison in 1960, he turned his life around and started a successful country music career, writing songs about the working-class which were very different from the counterculture and anti-Vietnam War music of the era; his songs "Okie from Muskogee" and "Are the Good Times Really Over (I Wish a Buck Was Still Silver)" were emblematic of the conservative culture of the American South and a longing for simpler times. Haggard's music was critical of both the counterculture movement and, later, even Vietnam; in "Are the Good Times Really Over", he lamented the change in American culture after the war and Richard Nixon lying to Americans' faces. Later in his life, he would criticize the Iraq War, while he was supportive of gun rights. From the 1970s to 1990s, he struggled with drug use, especially marijuana, cigarettes, and cocaine. In 2010, he was awarded a Kennedy Center Honor for his outstanding contribution to American culture, especially country music, of which he became a legend. He died on his 79th birthday in 2016, and his last song, "Kern River Blues", was released after his death.